Titan Legions (List)
The Orders of the Collegia Titanicus are the iron fist of the Emperor's rule. A velvet glove would serve no purpose. - Grand Master Augrim, Divisio Militaris Order of Imperial Eagles of the Adeptus Mechanicus]] The Titan Legions of the Adeptus Mechanicus' Collegia Titanica have proud histories, as the origins of some stretch back to before the time of the Unification Wars and the Great Crusade that forged the Imperium of Man. These nigh unstoppable, towering mechanical behemoths known as Titans are the pinnacle of the Adeptus Mechanicus' superior technological knowledge and the prime example of the Imperium's military might. Manufactured on the Mechanicus' Forge Worlds, these embodiments of the Omnissiah stalk the battlefields of the Imperium, utilising arcane technology and terrible weaponry to unleash their apocalyptic fury upon the Emperor of Mankind's foes. These great war machines are revered as much for their long service and past deeds as they are for the superior firepower they can unleash upon the enemies of Mankind. History of the Collegia Titanica holding the line against Traitor Titan Legions]] advance]] During the Age of Terra the human race advanced beyond its ancient pre-industrial past to obtain spacefaring capability. During this ancient time, Mankind began to slowly settle the habitable worlds in its own solar system and in the star systems near its homeworld using massive sublight starships. Mars was one of the first colony worlds that was located near the Cradle of Humanity. But during the massive exodus into space to colonise the unknown reaches of the galaxy, interstellar space travel and communications became erratic as Warp Storms became more frequent and more intense as the birth pangs of the Chaos God Slaanesh roiled the Immaterium. Billions eventually died as a result of the wars and starvation that ran rampant during this dark period, which is known to Imperial savants as the Age of Strife. Mars eventually found itself cut off from Terra and all the other human-settled worlds during this period, and its leaders could no longer acquire sufficient food or resources to accommodate its large population. Mars was soon consumed by strife as its society drifted into anarchy and a new revolutionary idea began to spread amongst its people, a religion focused on the technology needed to ensure survival. This was the Cult Mechanicus dedicated to the worship of the Machine God. Under the direction of the Mechanicus' Tech-Priests, the cultists set about restoring order to their world. When the Tech-Priests of Mars built their first temples to the Machine God and finally restored order to the Red Planet after the Long Night had passed, they also laid the basis for one of the future military arms of the Cult Mechanicus, known as the Titan Legions. The vast robotic fighting machines they built to withstand the hostile environment of their homeworld were called Titans. Since that bygone era, the Titan Legions have become the backbone of the armies of the Adeptus Mechanicus. Once the Mechanicus agreed to join with Terra and forge the Imperium after the signing of the Treaty of Mars, their power came to serve the God-Emperor, who the Mechanicus recognise as the Omnissiah, the physical avatar of the Machine God. Bristling with weaponized turrets and possessing potent weapons capable of leveling fortresses and obliterating entire armies of enemy troops, the Titans became the ponderous battleships of the battlefield. Revered for their technological advancement and connection to the Machine God's divinity, Titans have a holiness invested in them by virtue of their antiquity and technical complexity. To the Tech-Priests of Mars the Titans represent something more than just fighting machines but as a personal aspect of their beloved Omnissiah. When the Cult Mechanicus took to the stars, hoping to find remnants of human knowledge lost to history, they settled on worlds throughout the galaxy. Founding new colonies of the Cult Mechanicus, each of these so-called Forge Worlds became a replica of Mars with its temples to the Machine God, enormous spiring hive cities and innumerable factories and manufactorums. Each of these new worlds was protected by its own Titan Legion. On Terra, once the Warp Storms abated after the birth of Slaanesh, a new age of rebuilding and resurgence began, the Age of the Imperium. Conquering the various techno-barbarians and warlords that ruled Terra, a far-sighted visionary rose from the ashes. His knowledge of past technologies astounded all who spoke to him. Known only as the Emperor, this great leader of Mankind united the warring people of Terra and prepared to launch his Great Crusade -- the great reconquest of the galaxy with his genetically-engineered Legiones Astartes at the forefront. Treaty of Mars ]] When the Emperor began his Great Crusade to reunite the worlds of Mankind the first human colony he encountered was the Red Planet, Mars. Heralded by all those who met him as the Omnissiah, the Machine God incarnate, some within the Cult Mechanicus were not entirely pleased with this turn of events. A few of these malcontents incited a short and bloody insurrection against those within the Cult who called for an alliance with the Emperor, but eventually the opposition was crushed and Mars and Terra were finally reunited after millennia of separate development by the Treaty of Mars. This agreement formally founded the Imperium of Man as an alliance between Terra and the Mechanicus. With the massive human resources of Terra and the colossal technical and industrial power of Mars, the Emperor could begin his mighty enterprise of reconquering the galaxy on a firm foundation. Many long-forgotten planets were liberated and many more worlds were settled anew. Over the next 200 Terran years the Imperium of Man rapidly expanded across the galaxy. Forge Worlds throughout the galaxy were finally able to reestablish communications with Mars once the Great Crusade began and many scientific advances and discoveries of lost technologies were spread across the Imperium as a result. The acknowledgment of Mars as the preeminent centre of the Cult Mechanicus and leader of the Forge Worlds was reaffirmed and Mechanicus spacecraft began to travel between the worlds of the Imperium regularly. The considerable might of the Forge Worlds, including their Titan Legions, were soon added to the forces of the Great Crusade itself. The Horus Heresy ]] Reaver-class Titan fighting Titans from the Legio Tempestus during the Schism of Mars]] The Great Crusade continued to expand outwards, until the Imperium encompassed nearly the entire galaxy. At that time a new and unexpected threat emerged to challenge Mankind's dominance over the galaxy. This was the rebellion that would be known to later ages as the Horus Heresy. This revolt was instigated and led by the Warmaster Horus, the greatest and most beloved of the Emperor's sons, the Primarchs. The rebellion began on the farthest Eastern Fringes of the galaxy with the Warmaster's virus-bombing of those Space Marines whose loyalties to him were suspect on the world of Istvaan III, and soon took hold amongst half of the Space Marine Legions and many of the Titan Legions serving under the command of the Warmaster. Schism of Mars , Kelbor-Hal]] It is not entirely clear how Horus managed to turn such a significant percentage of the armies under his command against the Emperor, but he was known to be a very skilled and persuasive leader who commanded immense personal loyalty amongst his subordinates. But even before the opening stages of his planned insurrection occurred, he knew he would have to secure the support of the Adeptus Mechanicus and their superior technology and weapons if he was to defeat the Emperor and conquer the galaxy. Horus won over the loyalty of many of the Mechanicus' Tech-Adepts after promising them the lost secrets of ancient Standard Template Construct (STC) technology that had been recovered from the worlds of the recently subjugated Auretian Technocracy by the Sons of Horus Legion. The climate on Mars was full of discontent during this tumultuous time. There were tense relations between the various Techno-Magi with sporadic outbreaks of espionage and violence being committed against the various forges that represented the primary sociopolitical units of Mars. There were even unconfirmed suspicions that the Titan Legions had already secretly chosen sides in case of a potential conflict. Regulus, the Adeptus Mechanicus' representative to the Warmaster Horus who had already thrown in his lot with the Warmaster, was sent to Mars to secure the tentative support of the Fabricator-General of Mars, Kelbor-Hal. Regulus convinced the Fabricator-General of the Warmaster's resolve to support increased autonomy for the Mechanicus against the autocratic rule of the Emperor. As a show of his appreciation for the Fabricator-General's support, Horus provided information to Kelbor-Hal that allowed the Mechanicus to open a repository of forbidden knowledge known as the Vaults of Moravec, which had been sealed for a thousand years. The Emperor himself had decreed that the vaults never be opened, for they contained innumerable artefacts of technology that had been fashioned or courrupted by the malign power of Chaos. But the deal was struck, and the Fabricator-General accepted Horus' proposal and joined forces with the Warmaster, assisting the Traitors with all of the technology of Mankind at his disposal. When this repository was reopened, there was all manner of forbidden arcane knowledge and weaponry that had obviously been tainted by the corrupting influence of Chaos stored within. Soon the corruption spread throughout the forges and temples across the Red Planet as scrap code -- Chaos-contaminated digital source code that was infected with an arcane computer virus -- infested the logi-stacks and Cogitator (computer) archives of the Adeptus Mechanicus, causing literal Chaos to emerge in any Cogitator system that was networked to one of its infected counterparts. The Fabricator General and his Dark Mechanicum allies used this disruption to marshal the strength of their forces, intent on bringing the rule of Mars firmly under their control. Open warfare eventually erupted on the Red Planet as Martian forces, both civilian and military, fought one another in a deadly civil war that mirrored the larger conflict consuming the Imperium. Across the galaxy, open rebellion erupted as Space Marine Legion fought Space Marine Legion and Titans battled Titans. The members of what became known as the Dark Mechanicus supported Horus during the start of the Horus Heresy, participating in the attacks against the Loyalist Space Marine Legions during the Drop Site Massacre on Istvaan V. Throughout the Heresy they used dark and forbidden knowledge to help destroy the Loyalist forces. The Siege of Terra lay siege to the Imperial Palace during the Battle of Terra]] With 9 Space Marine Legions and the greater portion of the Adeptus Mechanicus' forces behind him, and 3 Loyalist Space Marine Legions nearly destroyed at Istvaan V, Horus unleashed his conflict upon the galaxy, which culminated in his assault on Terra. The Titan Legions under his command would play a vital role in the Battle of Terra, acting as heavy support for his ground forces. When the forces of the Warmaster began their assault on Terra, it was the Titan Legions, acting as siege-breakers, that ultimately breached the outer walls of the Imperial Palace, though at a heavy cost in both men and war machines. But ultimately, the Traitors' assault failed as the final events of the Heresy played out aboard the Warmaster's own flagship, the Vengeful Spirit. The Emperor triumphed during the confrontation between himself and the Chaos-corrupted Horus, but only at the cost of his own mortal wounding. The majority of the Traitor Legions scattered following this disastrous defeat, and the Imperial forces gave chase, unleashing the period known as the Scouring. Hunted and pursued, system by system, the Chaos Space Marine Traitor Legions and the Titan Legions eventually were driven into the Eye of Terror; a large nebula wrapped in hellish Warp Storms, where realspace and the Immaterium merge, breaking through dimensional barriers. The Traitors made their new homes amongst the numerous worlds within the Eye, inhabited by daemons and the other minions of Chaos. Exisiting outside the normal laws of realspace, time has flowed strangely for the remnants of the forces that fought for the Warmaster. The Traitor Legions remain trapped in servitude to the Ruinous Powers, building their strength and testing the Imperium’s defences for the time when they shall return and wreak terrible vengeance on those that saw them defeated ten millennia before. The Titans that took part in the Horus Heresy are also found alongside their Chaos Space Marine counterparts, on worlds ruled by the dark and corrupted Hereteks of the Dark Mechanicus, their great forms twisted and warped by the power of Chaos and their Machine Spirits replaced by the possessing souls of powerful daemons. Known Titan Legions Loyalist Titan Legions *''Imperial Eagles'' *'[[Imperial Fists (Titan Legion)|''Imperial Fists (Titan Legion)]]' *Legio Agravides'' *''Legio Annihilator'' *''Legio Astorum'' (Warp Runners) *''Legio Astraman'' (Morning Stars) *''Legio Crucius'' (Warmongers) *''Legio Destructor'' (Steel Beasts) *''Legio Fortidus'' *''Legio Gryphonicus ''(War Griffons) *''Legio Honorum'' (Death Bolts) *''Legio Ignatium'' (Fire Wasps) *''Legio Invicta'' *''Legio Invigilata'' (Emperor's Guard) *''Legio Metalica'' (Iron Skulls) *''Legio Ordo Sinister'' *''Legio Pallidus Mor'' (Pale Riders) *''Legio Tempestus'' *''Legio Ultima'' *''Legio Victorum'' (Foe Slayers) *''Nova Guard'' Traitor Titan Legions *''Burning Stars'' *''Death Stalkers'' *''Fire Masters'' *''Iron Skulls'' *''Legio Damnatus'' (Warped Dogs) *''Legio Damnosus'' (Lords of Rain) *''Legio Lacrymea'' (Harbingers of Grief) *''Legio Magna'' (Flaming Skulls) *''Legio Mortis'' (Deaths Heads) *''Legio Tempestor ''(Storm Lords) *''Legio Vulcanum I'' (The Dark Fire) *''Legio Vulcanum II'' *''Legio Vulturum'' *''Tiger Eyes'' Unknown Allegiance *''Legio Xerxes'' Sources *''Adeptus Titanicus'' (1st Edition) *''Adeptus Titanicus'' (2nd Edition) *''Codex: Eye of Terror'', p. 16 *''Codex: Titanicus'' (1st Edition) *''Mechanicum'' (Novel) by Graham McNeill *''Titan Legions'' (2nd Edition), pp. 11-16 *''Warhammer 40,000'' (5th Edition) Rulebook, p. 121 *''White Dwarf ''108 (UK) Category:Collegia Titanica Category:Imperium Category:Chaos Category:Adeptus Mechanicus Category:Traitor Titan Legions